jebus presents … Neil Hagerty Royal Trux Howling Hex *

* (restored)

“I wish I had a thousand bucks/I wish I was the Royal Trux” – from “Death of an Heir of Sorrow” by the Silver Jews

As a teenager in the 90s, Royal Trux were kind of my Velvet Underground. They had a similar kind of cool underground feel with surface hints of the avant-garde, a we’re going to do whatever we want and it’s going to be artsy and self-conscious in a rock context. The Velvet Underground went on to influence pretty much every decent rock band to come out after them, and, eventually, were inducted into the Rock n’ Roll Hall of Fame. Neil Haggerty, the god behind the Royal Trux, hasn’t had that problem.

The first time I heard Royal Trux was on a mix tape a friend made me, which must have been 1995. The song was “Map of the City” from the album Thank You. The song stood out because it didn’t seem to fit in any particular category that I was used to, and the lyrics, although melodic and even catchy in places, were sometimes sinister too: “I knew right then I could love her forever even when her breasts were all rotted with cancer,” and sometimes absurd: “A sailor has to masturbate until the ship lands/a lot of things happen out on the open sea/I’m gonna sell Arizona to Japan,” and even kind of ethereal: “I’m drawing up a plan for the city with ten thousand crooked stairs/some lead up to heaven, some look through you like you’re not even there.” So I went and bought their albums.

Short History:

Royal Trux released their first album in 1988, with Hagerty as guitar player/ singer/ multi- instrumentalist and then girlfriend Jennifer Herrenna as singer/multi-instrumentalist. Their second album, 1990’s Twin Infinitives, was straight up avant-garde, discordant experimentation – tape loops, spoken word, noise, etc. On their third album (Untitled, 1992) they had begun to develop more of what would become their sound via a low-fi approach. The album has a stripped-down dirty country-rock feel (kind of), via crackly acoustic guitars drenched here and there in distorted guitar fuzz and melodic rambling vocals. Their fourth album, Cats and Dogs, is where they started to really sound like a band. They hired a drummer, guitarist and bass player, and a lot fans consider it to be their best album. The songs on Cats and Dogs are far from polished, but they are a little more cohesive, and Hagerty had begun to delve into an ongoing exploration of 70s rock, albeit from a distance, that would mark the rest of their albums. Songs like “Turn of the Century” and “Teeth” are really awesome. They were subsequently signed to Virgin Records for a short stint (the record company was looking for some hip credibility) and they moved to a farmhouse in Virginia. Their next nine albums would continue to explore 70s rock aesthetic, going deep into guitar-riff based songs on some, jam-type stuff on others, arty collage stuff here and there, always with a distance and enough discordant noise to keep it conceptual enough to retain a cool art factor.

By the time Cats and Dogs had come out (1993) Royal Trux had started to gain a reputation as a semi-underground cool band. Their coolness came partially from their unique sound, a blend of 70s rock and the low-fi indie stuff that was happening in the early 90s. It didn’t hurt that the latter was becoming popular, through bands like Smog, Palace, Sebedoh, Pavement, Guided by Voices, The Silver Jews, etc. However, the Royal Trux didn’t quite fit in with those bands’ sound, mostly because of their 70s rock thing: a “Sticky Fingers”/”Exile on Main Street”-era Stones/Joe Walsh aesthetic filtered through the low-fi indie mode. Grunge had recently “broke” a few years earlier, and it also embraced a 70s guitar rock-type aesthetic (mostly via Black Sabbath, Led Zepplin, Cheap Trick, NY and London 70s punk, etc), but Royal Trux did not fit in there either – even less so, actually. This added to their outsider factor. Also, they openly talked about their heroin use in interviews, which I guess made them seem kind of snarky and rebellious. They looked pretty cool too, indifferent: Hagerty with his shallow pale face, brooding, spaced-out look, Jennifer Herrenna with her sexy, rock god fuck-you look. Haggerty was one of the few indie guitarists at the time (along with J Mascis, for one), who could get away with occasional guitar- god style rhythms and solos, this at a time when overt displays of chops were seen as kind of passé – but it worked because it made his stuff seem like he either didn’t give a shit about what other bands were doing or like he was smart enough not to emulate them.

Around 2000, Hagerty and Herrenna broke up, thus ending the Royal Trux. Since then, Hagerty recorded some with Ian Svenonius on his project Weird War, he did a few solo things, but mostly he has been recording and playing under the moniker The Howling Hex with various people. I love the Howling Hex.

In retrospect, Hagerty via Royal Trux was important to me because he filled a certain hole that other low-fi indie artists weren’t at the time. I was all about that stuff. LIke a lot of kids, I craved something that seemed new and authentic. Before this, the closest I came was gangster rap, bands like NWA, the Ghetto Boys, Too Short, etc. I think Smog was the first indie lo-fi thing I heard. I really loved Smog, and Callahan’s stuff was gritty, smart, minimalist, idiosyncratic and artsy enough to come close to what I craved, but Hagerty had all of that and rocked too, and his playing off of Herrenna added something that a solo artist would miss. Also, he seemed kind of arrogant and egotistical, or at least indifferent (I don’t know if he was – he actually probably wasn’t), which I liked as a young dude.

Last I’d read, Hagerty had moved to New Mexico, which added to his outsider persona. I hadn’t thought about Hagerty for a while and then, last July, I thought of him. I googled his name and read that he now lives in Denver Colorado (where I live) and that his current incarnation of the Howling Hex was playing every Thursday that month at a dive bar a mile from my house. This was completely random and a big surprise. The next night I went to see them.

I didn’t recognize Hagerty at first because I was used to seeing pics of him grimacing behind long hair hanging in his face and I expected him to look kind of middle-aged and haggard at this point in his life. But he was sitting in a booth talking energetically to some guys (his two bandmates), clean-cut and looking about 25-years-old. He was skinnier than I imagined, for some reason, even though he was always skinny in pics I had seen of him. I probably could have talked to him, since the place was pretty empty, but whenever I’m around people I admire I never know what to say. So I just drank a beer and waited for them to play.

It was me and about five other guys my age, alone, watching Howling Hex. It was amazing. Here is a pic I took on my phone of Hagerty playing):

There is tons more to know about Hagerty – e.g., he’s written and published a book, his work with Pussy Galore, producer, his current obsession with noterna music, etc. The above stuff is just my personal, and limited, experience with his work. Here are some good interviews that go more into depth:

http://www.monsterfresh.com/2011/09/04/neil-michael-hagerty-howling-hex-interview/
http://blog.wfmu.org/freeform/2011/10/earth-junk-a-conversation-with-neil-hagerty.html

Here are some of my favorite Royal Trux, Hagerty and Howling Hex songs that I was able to find on youtube:

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p.s. Hey. ** David Ehrenstein, Hi. Ingratiating, great way to put it. Yes, I read that Schumacher interview. Didn’t believe very many words of it. Ha ha. ** Steve Erickson, Everyone, Steve E. dropped by to direct us to his reviews of DAVID CROSBY: REMEMBER MY NAME, here, and THE LOAD, here. ** _Black_Acrylic, Welcome home to the big D. Great, ready, willing and even slightly slobbering for the Call birth post whenever you’re ready. ** Corey Heiferman, Hi. Pat Buttram! ‘Green Acres’! Now there’s one of the great works of television genius, if you ask me. ‘The Book of Disquiet’, yes, I did read that, and, yes, I remember its greatness. I’m going to re-buy and reread that. Thanks! And I’ll given a close listen to ‘Folksonomnies’ by Laura Luna Castillo. Everyone, Corey says, ‘Thought you and others here might enjoy the album “Folksonomnies” by Laura Luna Castillo. “The transmutational possibility within these tracks lie within the listeners’ aptitude for relishing minute variants which mutate and evolve within one’s very attention. It’s not exactly lofi. It’s not exactly drone. There’s a patience certainly threaded throughout. In each track, a narrative to simplicity and complexity intermingling – a slow dance with the listener who is wooed and led into immersion with the tenderness of the rapt composer.”’ Here to listen and/or download and here to purchase. Oh, yeah, ‘Baal’. I remember liking that too. Nice reminder. Starting a press advice? Hm, don’t do it for the money or anticipate paying the expenses of doing it via sales. Social media presence on all platforms. Both print and e-versions if possible. Uh, hm, it’s a great thing to do. I’ll have to think more about advice. It’s been a long time since I had a press, and that was pre- internet and computers and almost everything. ** Bill, Hi, Bill. He is, right? Nobody really like him anymore in films. I didn’t know there was an Elliott Sharp bio. Huh. Yeah, I like his work a lot, and I met him a few times back in the 80s/NYC days. I’ll hunt that down. Hang in there. ** Armando, Hi. Ah, I see. Okay, that sounds tough. I will make queries. I know you’re not into things like crowdfunding, and, well, neither am I, but … What kind of size budget are thinking you’ll need? ** Right. Some years ago there was a guy who called himself jebus who hung out here and one day made us a post/paean to his musical hero Neil Hagerty, and there it is, reborn. See you tomorrow.